As sometimes happens, the Academy of Arts and Sciences gives out an honorary award to some industry
great, and when they screen a montage of the man's glorious achievements, you wonder how in
the heck he ever won anything. Dino de Laurentiis, who started in a postwar Italy where producers were
often described as men who wanted to sleep with lots of actresses, had a career populated mostly by classics
from Fellini, and a long succession of dogs of various breeds. Outside of Federico-land, you have
some misunderstood greats like Richard Fleischer's Barabbas and David Lynch's Dune, and perhaps
rare real winner (Lynch again, with Blue Velvet). What's left? The White Buffalo?
Flash Gordon? Barbarella? The Bible is one of de Laurentiis' more honorable
efforts, and it brings
together some really great talent, but something in its conception and its execution is fundamentally
off-kilter.

Synopsis:

The book of Genesis is depicted in episodic, poetic vignettes illustrating the
stories of Adam and Eve, Cain and Abel, Sarah and Abraham, The Tower of Babel, Noah's Ark, and
others.

The common wisdom with The Bible is to say that John Huston makes a great Noah but the rest
of the show is a saggy mess that isn't saved by great performances from the likes of George C. Scott and Ava
Gardner. John Huston is a great filmmaker but it is true that some of his latter-day efforts have
an air of indifference about them, as if they had been conceived as a way to shore up the director's gambling
debts. The Bible is thoughtful, reverent, and even innovative in the way it approaches the
Bible for the screen. It certainly has more to recommend it than the conventional Hollywood approach,
as best represented by The Robe. But it is still a big, slow, and boring film
that is difficult to relate to emotionally.

First off are the bizarre cinematographic and visual choices. Natural wonders are used to illustrate
the creation of the Earth, and most of the episodes unspool without flashy special effects, which is
good. But too much of the film is dark and dank; there are almost no attractive images at all, which
is surprising coming from the great Giuseppe Rotunno. The look is still big-budget glossy, and many
scenes, like the Tower of Babel, use very elaborate production values, but the impact on the
screen just isn't there.

The story is told straighter than straight, with little or no elaboration on the few scant words
granted each episode in Genesis. When the human relationships have some depth, as with Sarah and
Abraham, some feeling comes through, but little interpretation is given these fable-like stories
and they remain sketches. By contrast, the much-maligned Sodom and
Gomorrah by Robert Aldrich takes a few basic facts from the Good Book and spins an engaging
yarn that elaborates and enlarges the story while staying true to a reasoned interpretation of the
tale's meaning, in narrative and symbolic ways. The changing of Lot's wife into a pillar of salt ends
up with a dozen converging meanings. Jehovah's vengeance punishes Lot by turning her into literally
that which he worships, money. Aldrich brings in apocalyptic destruction, the film resonates with echoes
of Kiss Me Deadly and other 'modern' concerns, yet is still the Bible story we've all heard.
The Bible tries to stick with the letter of the book, but just doesn't do enough with it.

The Bible gives us a parade of lost stars, like Peter O'Toole as a triad of Angels. Despite
the low-key approach, the familiar faces keep us from perceiving this as anything but yet another
Hollywood (or
in this case, Cinecittá) product. We can't all be Pier Paolo Pasolini with his Gospel According to
St. Matthew, shooting in grainy b&w and using non-actors, but it has to be admitted that that show
is more deeply felt than most 'Bibical epics', put together.

The Bible is a super-production, a roadshow 70mm giant of a film of the kind that is no longer
made, and it will entertain and interest many a Savant reader for that alone (my defense, to be honest).
The Noah's Ark sequence, and to a lesser extent the Tower of Babel, are very pleasing, and Mr. Huston's
narrating voice and benign presence are charming. Only after Chinatown, eight years later, did he
again seem capable of anything sinister. The Bible is inherently watchable if for no other reason
than to soak in Huston's wonderful voice and see the sparkle in his eye.
1

Fox's DVD of The Bible is a great improvement on earlier home video incarnations. The widescreen
laserdisc of more than fifteen years ago was a washed out, colorless failure. Visually, this is
still not a dazzling experience, but Savant has to guess that the original roadshow might have
looked very similar. A trailer is the only extra.

On a scale of Excellent, Good, Fair, and Poor,The Bible ... in the Beginningrates:Movie: Good
Video: Good
Sound: Good
Supplements: Trailer
Packaging: Snapper case
Reviewed: October 19, 2001

Footnotes:

1.Savant was privileged to see Mr. Huston a few months before he
passed away, as he left a voiceover session at Buzzy's in Hollywood. Bowed and hunched, he seemed small
in his old age. He carried with him an oxygen tank
with a nose-tube, but as he left his roving eye caught mine and 'twinkled' at me. He looked to be
having a great time, even with one foot in the grave. This must have
been the most charming rogue ever to swindle a career out of Hollywood. Buzzy's probably had to pay
him cash and he was on the way to the track! Return